As he began his commencement address, Bill Taylor reflected on the movie titles that best describe the classes he has addressed in the past, and those that best describe the transformation of the Class of 2018. Here is an excerpt from Taylor’s commencement speech delivered on Saturday, May 26, 2018:
“We are here, of course, to celebrate you – the Class of 2018….yours is a special class, one with its own character and collective sense of self.
Classes have a way of standing out as collective entities, just as individual students stand out in the memories of teachers who taught them. In my career in education, I have seen many different classes graduate. Sometimes, for me, classes begin to evoke movie titles in terms of how I remember some of them. Now, since of I am of a certain age, it stands to reason that the movie titles that come to my mind are also of a certain age.
There is one playful class that always reminds me of Ferris Beuhler’s Day Off. Another similar class, one not as colorful, reminds me of Catch Me If You Can. Then, there is the class that will also evoke memories of A Beautiful Mind. And, since every class has its opposite, there is a class that stands out as Dumb and Dumber. There was the Groundhog Day class and the one that was simply The Sum of All Fears.
So, to what movie title shall we ascribe the Class of 2018? I have to be honest with you that at the end of last year, the titles in the running ranged from Crash to O Brother Where Art Thou — meaning no one really knew what your class was going to do. And, I will admit that for some, the expectations were not great which is admittedly unfair.
After the first few weeks of this school year, there were rumblings through the hallways of Cluett and the Dann Building. Something was amiss in the early expectations of the Class of 2018. You were not adrift or without goals. On the contrary, you emerged this year as a class full of leaders, of thoughtful protectors of the ideals of the School, of young men dedicated toward your own growth, that of your classmates, and of the School.
So, in my mind, the movie that I will associate with your class is The Incredibles. You are the class that secretly harbors superpowers that were concealed from those of us who thought we had you figured out. This is the class, for example, that has not lost a single member during the course of the year which is, in and of itself, somewhat incredible in the lives of schools and their senior classes.
Well Done!”
Watch Bill Taylor’s full commencement speech here.